The silence after the collapse was unbearable.
Ren's body floated in a void of fragments—shards of glass spinning weightlessly around him, each one catching a faint reflection of himself. Some showed his smirk, some showed his pain, some showed… nothing at all.
He tried to move, but his limbs felt heavy, as if the Pane itself had buried chains in his veins.
Am I… dead?
The thought barely formed before a voice cut through the emptiness—soft, steady, and terrifyingly intimate.
"No," it whispered. "You're closer to living than you've ever been."
His eyes opened fully, and the void around him began to peel away, like curtains of broken light being drawn back.
And there she was.
The silver-haired girl.
She stood barefoot among the shards, her white dress unblemished, her presence real in a way that even Selene never was. The fragments that drifted near her didn't cut her skin. They bent away, orbiting her like they were afraid to touch.
